This isn’t my official resume, just a narrative summary regarding my qualifications as a screenwriter. Honestly? I’ve had hundreds of paid analyses by Hollywood readers over the last 15 years, studied all the screenwriting books, etc., to the point where I practically have a Master’s in Creative Arts.
The Backstory
Back around 2004, after years of fighting the University of Texas over my dismissal, I had exhausted all the available legal and administrative ways to fight a hate crime. Then I ran into my neighbor Rita out in Lago Vista.
Why don’t you write a movie about what happened?
Doh! Great idea!
Six months later, I sent out drafts of CRASHDOWN, the story of my dismissal. This was before Final Draft, the software that formats a script for you. I typed it all on a PC, setting the Tabs and Margins and Fonts and Spacing…
The Reality
Biopics are very difficult, especially when it involves a technical subject. Worse yet, A Beautiful Mind had just come out. Another biopic about a schizophrenic in academia? Did he get a Nobel Prize?! No, thanks…
It’s even harder when it’s your own story. I ended up working on half a dozen other scripts to develop my skills. Over the years, several placed well in major contests, and they all eventually received very good reviews.
Screenplays are really complicated. You have to accomplish so much in a bare minimum of words. Structure, character development, action sequences, and character arcs. This appealed to my engineering mind.
The hardest for me was subtext. As a schizophrenic; well, I learned that I never really understood subtext. Lots of dramatic elements I never understood – why people lie, how easily they do it; because, basically, I pretty well say what I feel, exactly as I feel and think, and don’t bother with subtext or niceties.
Then there’s grammar. Punctuation! Word selection. You can’t use big words because the readers read very fast and have only so much time for their investigation.
My characters have been my best friends. Hey – people have virtual friends everywhere now, on Facebook, Instagram, you name it. What’s it to you if I prefer to live in their world instead of mine? (Full disclosure: they’ve been my ONLY friends for 20+ years.)
The Ende
Ultimately, my screenplays are too concept-heavy. The target for Hollywood for all screenplays is teenage boys. I write for adults. I refuse to repeat the theme every 15 minutes because some snot-nosed kid is watching on a smartphone while texting his BFF.
On the plus side, the scripts are excellent reading. They read just like a short story. Better! You can finish it in 90 minutes or so, one page a minute.
CRASHDOWN survives, in several versions. One is a regular drama. The others are contained scripts: two actors, one location. They accomplished their purpose: therapy, to help me get over the angst and grief from what Texas did to me.
Bill H. Clark